4 ms·

> Why cant we just give employees dignity and a fair wage? We do and that's tipped wages. A career waiter in a major American city can make over 100k, which is

by Aunche 4y ago

> Why cant we just give employees dignity and a fair wage? We do and that's tipped wages. A career waiter in a major American city can make over 100k, which is several times more than what they would make in Europe. Even if you adjust for cost of living and median incomes, it's still going to be much higher. On the low end of the spectrum, tipped wages and untipped wages would be both at minimum wage.

ac29 4y ago
> A career waiter in a major American city can make over 100k, Yeah, but this is counter service we are talking about. The person making your latte is not making $100k/year. When I worked at a coffee place ~20 years ago, tips were about $1/hour per employee and that was like 10% of my income. Certainly wages and presumably tips are higher now, but these jobs still dont pay much over minimum wage.
- Aunche 4y ago
  I talked about waiters at high end restaurants because that's where the effect of tipping is most evident, but the same market dynamics exist for counter service as well. For employees and the restaurant itself, tipping is almost always going to be better than non-tipping. If these employees aren't getting paid enough, that's something that can only be solved by raising the minimum wage.
bluedino 4y ago
According to Google: As of Nov 2, 2022, the average annual pay for a Waiter in New York City is $35,180 a year. Just in case you need a simple salary calculator, that works out to be approximately $16.91 an hour. This is the equivalent of $676/week or $2,931/month.
- klondike_ 4y ago
  This presumably doesn't include tips. The tips are also untaxed, giving them an even greater advantage
  - maerF0x0 4y ago
    > The tips are also untaxed afaik tips are taxed as income tax. Yes I'm sure practically it gets underreported but servers definitely would raise suspicions if they reported $0.
deadbolt 4y ago
It's not just waiters though, in fact the article specifically uses coffee shop employees as an example. I would be quite surprised if they're clearing 100k, even in a major city.
- paleotrope 4y ago
  Coffee shop employees are not Tipped employees. They get minimum wage. This conflation of actual legally tipped employees (who get a substantially smaller than minimum wage wage) and everyone else is leading to really stupid ideas.

by Aunche 4y ago

ac29 4y ago

> A career waiter in a major American city can make over 100k, Yeah, but this is counter service we are talking about. The person making your latte is not making $100k/year. When I worked at a coffee place ~20 years ago, tips were about $1/hour per employee and that was like 10% of my income. Certainly wages and presumably tips are higher now, but these jobs still dont pay much over minimum wage.

Aunche 4y ago
I talked about waiters at high end restaurants because that's where the effect of tipping is most evident, but the same market dynamics exist for counter service as well. For employees and the restaurant itself, tipping is almost always going to be better than non-tipping. If these employees aren't getting paid enough, that's something that can only be solved by raising the minimum wage.

bluedino 4y ago

According to Google: As of Nov 2, 2022, the average annual pay for a Waiter in New York City is $35,180 a year. Just in case you need a simple salary calculator, that works out to be approximately $16.91 an hour. This is the equivalent of $676/week or $2,931/month.

klondike_ 4y ago
This presumably doesn't include tips. The tips are also untaxed, giving them an even greater advantage
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  > The tips are also untaxed afaik tips are taxed as income tax. Yes I'm sure practically it gets underreported but servers definitely would raise suspicions if they reported $0.

deadbolt 4y ago

It's not just waiters though, in fact the article specifically uses coffee shop employees as an example. I would be quite surprised if they're clearing 100k, even in a major city.

paleotrope 4y ago
Coffee shop employees are not Tipped employees. They get minimum wage. This conflation of actual legally tipped employees (who get a substantially smaller than minimum wage wage) and everyone else is leading to really stupid ideas.